Tag Archive: weight management

Well here we are officially 14 days into the new year, so I thought it was time I give everyone an update on where I am and where I am going with my goals so far. The GREAT news is I have lost 11 pounds already in 2013! It’s about 1/5 of what I’m looking for for the year, but I am VERY happy with myself so far. I have been very disciplined about my eating and done a very good job sticking to my diet and the results are absolutely showing. My clothes fit better and some are even a little baggy now and I just feel 100% better. I have two of those five pound blocks and one of the one pounders off my body for good and I am VERY excited! I’m a dad, and getting this weight off is VERY important to me. I need to be here to take care of my girls and everything else I do in the world is meaningless if I’m not here for them. I think when you start looking at it that way it gets a lot easier to stick to your game plan.

I have started my push-up, sit-up, and squat challenge but have been taking it easy while on the restricted diet. I’ll be relaxing the diet for a few weeks in a couple days though and plan to increase that activity as soon as I do. It’s been cold, so I haven’t been getting out to run yet, but I am taking the stairs at work and trying to generally increase my activity. My birthday is coming up, so I am moving into a maintenance phase on the diet (I’m realistic and still want to have fun!) and upping the physical output till February 1st, then back onto the strict diet for February with the goal of dropping another 20 pounds or so before I get focused on my running.

Anyways… I know people start off very motivated in the beginning of the year, but I know from experience that if you use this time to build momentum you can carry through with your goals for the entire year. Blogging this here keeps me involved and focused on whats important.

Over the next few weeks I’ll start building out my list of races for the year starting with a spring 5K or two leading into my summer and fall mud runs, with a possible BIG event later in the year. Who knows what that will be? Could be anything from a 10K to a 50 mile trail race… only time will tell!

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I have to admit over the last two years I have let myself go. The stress of corporate life and my doctorate along with some undiagnosed health issues really got the best of me and I ballooned up to nearly 280 pounds. I thought I carried it well until I had to buy a 3XL shirt! I nearly died! Last year I played a lot with food. I ate raw vegan, I ate vegetarian, and I ate a new way… Paleo. For me this just works. I dropped about 30 pounds on the HCG diet with my doctor and have kept it off with the exception of a few holiday pounds. So here is the 2013 plan. As of right now I am on day 3 of a 21 day HCG cycle. I should lose another 18-25 pounds and I am REALLY excited about that! Then my birthday, a few weeks of paleo eating and another 21 day cycle. That should put me near 200 pounds and pretty close to where I was when I was married 13 years ago.

In the mean time I am also doing the 100 push-up, 200 sit-up, and 200 squat challenges and trying to get some good long walks in on the nice days. Starting in the spring when it warms up I’ll start my daily runs back up and I’m going to shoot for 250 burpees by the end of the summer. I’m also going to start doing some off-road running races, several mud runs and maybe an off-road sprint triathlon. I know it sounds like a lot of training, but it’s really not. I’m trying to keep it under 30 minutes a day and am only at about 15 minutes right now. as the weight comes down I’ll also pull out my pull up bar and kick off the 100 pull-up challenge plan.

I know that sounds like a lot of exercise, but the core of my health changes are really focused on quality paleo eating. In essence it’s the “cave man” diet. Ask yourself would a cave man eat this? and if the answer is no… skip it. I eat all the fresh vegetables, fruit, and organic grass fed meat I want. No counting calories no real rules to follow other than avoid grains and dairy. At first this sounds very restrictive, but I can assure you I enjoy eating this way better than the crap I used to eat. Tonight we had lemon garlic roasted chicken, raw carrots, fresh strawberries, and a spinach salad. For me there is a LOT to get excited about there! I’ll be writing more about paleo eating in the coming weeks and sharing some recipes. If you want one to get you started try out these awesome gluten free, high protein paleo pancakes!

I’m only a few days into this, but I feel great and I will keep everyone posted on my progress.

Most people know I have been a paleo eater for a few months now and I thought I’d give a quick update and share a fantastic free resource! As of right now I am down about 25 pounds, but the more important thing is I feel awesome. The two main things Paleo cuts out are gluten (wheat) and dairy. I don’t know wich one has had the bigger effect for me, but I know I can absolutely feel a difference! A BIG part of eating Paleo if figuring out how to cut gluten. It’s in EVERYTHING! Right now on Amazon you can get a copy of Gluten Free Cookbook: Gluten Free Diet and Gluten Free Recipes for Your Good Health free from Amazon in the Kindle addition. If you have a Kindle or any iOS device or Android tablet you can get the free Kindle app for it and take advantage of this opportunity! I just downloaded this tonight, but I will try to do a more thorough review soon!

If you download this please let me know what you think in the comments!

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Anyone who knows me knows I live a healthy juicy lifestyle! My friend Shane from running on Juice turned me on to juicing a while back and I have been hooked ever since. I think people are curious about juicing, but are afraid to try it out, and I think thats just silly. You have not lived until you have had a glass of fresh apple juice with NOTHING in it but pure apple goodness! Thats all it took for me. The best news is thats is just the beginning. I have regularly made juices with 7-10 ingredients and when you start doing that you can get some truly amazing flavors, and to be honest about the same prep time as it would take to make toast and cereal.

If you don’t know I am a HUGE fan of Jason Vales 7 Pounds in 7 days and lost 10 pounds in a week drinking nothing but fresh fruit and veggie juice and I felt GREAT the entire time. In fact I still drink 2-3 juices or smoothies every day as part of my diet plan.

Lots of people worry about being overly hungry on this kind of plan and I can assure you I was never hungry. In fact, on many days I failed to drink all of the juices in my plan because I was completely full. It was a bit of a cultural adjustment getting used to eating so much produce, but the change was totally worth it. So, I am writing this quick post because I wanted to share a free e-book from Jason Vale that has 17 amazing juice recipes in it. To get it you will have to sign up for his news letter, but its totally worth it and you can always unsubscribe.

I yesterday made “Spring is in the Air” and it was amazing! This juice has 2 apples, 1 orange (peeled), and 1/2 a pink grapefruit (peeled) and juiced together, then blended with 8 strawberries, a banana, and a handful of ice. I thought it was delicious, but a bit tart, so I made it again with a 3rd apple and it was even better. Thats the wonderful thing about juicing is it is so easy to change a recipe so you always get something you will enjoy. Anyways, I could go on and on about the benefits of juicing and I probably will at some point… But for today I just wanted to make sure people knew about the free e-book and had a chance to get a copy because the recipes I have tried so far were awesome!

-Brad

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I learned a lot today… I was all excited about yesterdays 10 minute mile. I was confident and feeling awesome. So today was student appreciation at work today. I spent the day grilling hundreds of hotdogs for the students, but to provide a healthy option for staff I bought chicken italian sausage and caesar salad. At 100 calories less per link I thought this was a much healthier option. what I learned is while it may be a bit better it still wasn’t good. Krisy and I have been juicing and making smoothies for a couple of months now and I had been eating about 75% raw and vegetarian for a while now. I felt good, and really don’t give much thought to what I eat. We focus on having healthy things in the house and I attempt to make good decisions, but it’s not the focus of my life, and I am not really vegetarian, vegan, or a raw foodie, though I borrow from all of their play books. Anyways, I had a chicken sausage, caesar salad, a coke and a small bag of Doritos at lunch. This was a POWERFUL lesson in nutrition. Last night when I ran it was all I could do to keep moving, I was short of breath, my legs were heavy, and I felt like I was going to vomit the entire time. I toughed it out and got a run in, but I was regretting my eating choices all afternoon and the evening run really drove those feelings home. Lesson here: Eat better and run faster. I’m not sure how or why the impact was so sever, but I really felt terrible. Tomorrow will be a better day nutritionally.

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I ran a 10 minute mile today! I know thats not something most runners would get excited about, but I am totally stoked! If I can run a 10 minute mile being 50 pounds overweight, that is confirmation that I am strong and fast… I just don’t look it yet! Todays run was alone, after work. It was about 9:30 PM running in the cool nigh air. I really felt great. I had three smoothies today, a PB and J on Dave’s Killer Bread, and 3 vegetarian tacos (I’ll post the recipe for these soon. They are FANTASTIC!). I felt fast, breathing w2as easy and my legs felt fresh and light. I feel VERY encouraged by tonights performance!

Here are the details:

As you can see my splits got slower and slower, but I really felt quite good the entire time. What held me back was my weight. I’m currently 243 on a goal weight of about 180. All this running and good nutrition can only help though!